Puddletown

  • A FANTASTIC evening's entertainment was put on by the school governors to raise funds for St Mary's School, Puddletown.

Southover House at Tolpuddle was the perfect setting for this huge garden party held on a wonderfully warm and sunny evening.

Members of the school choir, brass band and orchestra provided entertainment of such high quality that it held its delighted audience spellbound throughout.

Several truly beautiful solos and duets were amongst the performances.

The performers were Martha Saunders, Alex Wood, Laurie Stevens, Kevin Penfold, Alastair Mair, Stephen Workman, Daniel Dodd, Ellie Timlin, Sally Gardens, Georgia O'Donaghue, Polly Kendall-Price, Chloe Tripp, Lucy Kirkby, Zoe Harvey, Charlotte Read, Georgina Elliot and Fern Bartlett.

Natalia Rogers provided accompaniment on harp.

Those esteemed local performers, the Tolpuddle Twitterers followed with further high-quality entertainment including duets by Emma Brunt and Michael Chapman.

The Charterists brought the musical entertainment to a close with a selection of excellent and rousing folk songs.

Gary Batt from Henry Dukes was a very entertaining auctioneer for the auction of promises that followed.

Bids flew in, fast and furious for the many and diverse lots offered.

The event's host, Michael Slocock, was delighted that the auction made double the profit he had estimated with a profit of £3,925.

The total net profit from the evening will be in the region of £7,500, and will go towards the building work at the school.

The total cost of the building work will be around half a million pounds, seven to ten percent of which has to be raised by the governors over the next three years.

The governors were totally overwhelmed by Michael and Terry Slocock's generosity and enormously grateful to them.

Affpuddle

  • PARISH council members learnt with concern the details of a recent serious incident at Hurst Bridge that involved a collision between a car and a motorbike.

Once more this underlined the need for a priority system at the bridge for which this parish council has been campaigning long and hard.

Following advice from the county councillor, Mrs Alex Brenton, the Dorset works organisation will be approached for statistics of repairs that have had to be carried out on the bridge as a result of accidents over the last ten years.

Hopefully this will provide further evidence for the need for action at this hazard spot.

The parish council had been contacted by the county council over measures to allow communities to have some input on how improvements could be made to keeping roads clearer during any spells of severe winter weather.

Councillor Stuart Wilson volunteered to keep a stock of salt and spread it on the road north of Briantspuddle crossroads to where it joins the B3390.

The county council also asked for preferred sites for grit bins, and locations near the war memorial and at the underpass near Rogers Hill farm will be suggested.

The county council will submit a fresh application to the county council’s roads and rights of way committee on July 1 2010 to install cattle grids on Turnerspuddle Heath to allow extensive cattle grazing on the heath.

Members have not supported these proposals since they were first put forward and there was nothing in the new proposals that made any real improvement.

The parish council has no problem with the principle of extensive grazing but feels there would be a much cheaper and simpler option to the one proposed.

Members were also concerned at the lack of supporting information that accompanied the notification and that there was no evidence of on-site notices about the application.

Should any resident have concerns about this application, they should contact their county councillor, Mrs Alex Brenton or the chair of the roads and rights of way committee, councillor Tim Munro.

The parish council had received information from a parishioner that the legal process to evict the travellers at Sares Wood had not been progressed due to a lack of evidence of complaints from residents about the site.

Members were of the view that the lack of complaints was largely due to Sares Wood now being a no-go area for residents due to the presence of the travellers.

This parish council would continue to lobby the county council to push for early closure of the site and to request that the highway used for the camp be declassified. This would help to secure the site more effectively and has the support of the effected land-owners.

If residents have any complaints about the travellers' site, please write to Mr Mark Street, Forestry Commission, The Queens House, Lynhurst SO43 7NH

Full minutes of the meeting and agendas will be on the parish website when completed and the next meeting of the parish council will be on Wednesday, July 14, 2010 at 7pm.

For more information, look at www.briantspuddle.info